I am guessing the only way to avoid that is to weigh every ball? I inspect them after they are cast, to look for lines, wrinkles, dents and dings. I want them to be perfectly smooth except for the Sprue. I am not sure why, but I have always preferred the cast ball to the swagged commercial ones. At times I had to use commercial ones, and they shot well, it just didn’t and still doesn’t feel right loading a store bought ball into a muzzleloader.
I didn’t see any tree rats yesterday morning. They didn’t com out until later when it warmed up and I was busy then. It was 15° F yesterday morning at 5:00 when I checked the thermometer. It didn’t get above freezing here in the valley until about 9:00 and that is when I had to start other things. Maybe this afternoon I will get a couple or some rabbits. I will find away to post pictures soon.